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Introduction: To look at ways for Juniors to get involved in Charity work. Encouraging children to engage with charities and fundraising is a vital part of their social development and one that BB can promote in their programme from a young age. Engaging with charities within the community and beyond will allow members of your company to have compassion for those less fortunate than themselves. Volunteering will help children to support causes and consider social issues and allow them to develop a passion for helping others. Looking at other people’s lives and finding ways to fundraise or raise issues can also develop a sense of achievement in the children by showing them they can accomplish change. Volunteering strengthens a sense of community whilst helping others. Looking beyond their everyday lives is an important part of their development and one that the Bible clearly identifies as a Christian duty. As we follow Jesus we are called to help our brothers and sisters around the world and to serve the last the least and the lost. Taken from the BB Juniors Pro Pack C-2-3

Resources

• Information on local charities
• Internet Access (if possible).
• Pens/Pencils
• Paper

Instructions

Activity 1 - Researching Local Volunteering Opportunities

Aim: To find out what opportunities are available and for the children to decide what they want to get involved in.

Preparation:
If necessary have some information available about local and national charities.

Instructions:
There are plenty of opportunities for volunteering and fundraising in your local area or on a national level. Find an organisation or charity that the group can identify with. If animals are the favourite then contact local animal shelters to see how you can get involved. Or search for non-profit organisations that promote animal welfare. By choosing a charity that the children can identify with, they will get more pleasure and satisfaction through the time they spend volunteering.

Ideas:
There are many organisations dedicated to promoting education in the developing world.
Compassion - www.compassion.com
World Vision . www.worldvision.org

Health
There may be health issues that children/leaders in your group may come across that you may wish to support.
Asthma UK www.asthma.org.uk
Diabetes - www.diabetes.org.uk

Safety
There are plenty of organisations dedicated to promoting safety. Supporting an organisation that promotes safety will also help the children to learn for themselves and understand how to keep safe themselves. RNLI, Fire Service, Road Safety etc.
RNLI - www.rnli.org.uk
Fire Service - www.fireservice.co.uk
Road Safety - www.dft.gov.uk/think

Hunger/Hornelessness
This area of charity is not just homeless shelters and soup kitchens, although they need a lot of help. There are also many opportunities to support the building of homes, feeding school children or supporting aid agencies to feed in crisis. There may be gap year students, planning to work for charities, in the church that may benefit from funds to support their trips in building homes etc. Habitat for Humanity - www.habitat.org/eurasia
Shelter - www.shelter.org.uk
Soul Action - www.soulaction.org

Disaster Relief
There are disasters happening across the world and these become high profile news stories. We can share these stories with the children and engage them in the relief operations by raising funds for aid organisations. By supporting a disaster relief charity you are able to help people rebuild their lives.
Tear fund - www.tearfund.org
Oxfam - www.oxfam.org
Christian Aid - www.christianaid.org.uk

Environment
Protecting our world, forests and wildlife has vital global importance that impacts everybody. We need to teach children that by investing in the future of the planet by supporting these organizations they are helping to protect and preserve the environment.
Greenpeace - www.greenpeace.org
RSPB - www.rspb.org.uk
WWF - www.worldwildlife.org

Community
Making up craft and stationary kits and collecting toys for a children’s hospice are great ways to reach in to the community. If the children love animals, they can collect supplies for the local animal shelter. There are endless opportunities available. Send care packages for our soldiers overseas.
RSPCA - www.rspca.org.uk
Children’s Hospices - www.childhospice.org.uk
Support Our Soldiers - www.supportoursoldiers.co.uk/carepackages.html

Tips/Advice:
It is important that children enjoy the experience and that they engage with something that they are interested in. Don’t let them feel forced into anything — it would defeat the object of Charity.

Extension Tasks/Adaptations:
Children have lots of great ideas — give them the opportunity to think what they want to do and come up with ideas so that they really engage with whatever you choose to do.

Activity 2 - Christmas Pudding Fundraiser

Aim: To raise money selling Christmas Puddings branded to your company in the community.

Preparation:
• Get the children to design your logo — with a Christmas drawing — possibly a Nativity scene.
• Visit the website www.ultimateplumpudding.co.uk to get information needed.

Instructions:
This all needs to be done in plenty of time before Christmas. By looking at the PDF you can make around £1 per pudding — this is a great way to make money at Christmas time for charities.

Tips/Advice:
• Fundraising with puddings is simple, can be repeated year after year and can work alongside other fundraising projects. Gather people together or add to a mailing and you can sell puddings.
• Get children to sell to their teachers, schools and families. If you engage them with the reason for raising money you will sell more.

Activity 3 - Host A Hunger Banquet

Aim: To plan a hunger banquet to invite parents and friends to.

Instructions:
To get the children to learn about the issues of poverty and hunger this is a unique exercise and a great way to included parents and friends of the church. Hosting a Hunger Banquet will help to raise awareness and help the guests to experience for themselves how many across the world are affected by hunger.

The Idea
• The Hunger Banquet will:
• educate everyone present on hunger issues.
• raise money to support the charity of your choice,
• Foster a sense of community between BB and the church

Publicity
• Get the children to create posters and fliers. Parents and friends need to know that the event is being hosted for everyone to learn about hunger.

On The Night
• Guests must draw a ticket at random when they arrive at the event. The ticket will assign them each to one of three brackets High — Middle - Low - income - They will then receive a meal corresponding to that income bracket.

Reflect
• Finally, all guests are invited to share their thoughts after the meal. This can be a guided reflection or allow your guests to speak freely.
• After a Hunger Banquet, few participants leave with full stomachs, but all possess a greater understanding of the problems of hunger and poverty and will hopefully be
motivated to do something about them.

Tips/Advice:
There is a Lot of planning involved so start planning well in advance of the date planned. Get the
children to do as much as possible — even by hosting the event

Extension Tasks/Adaptations:
Facts about hunger
• 852 million people world wide suffer from hunger, that’s more than the populations of the U.S., Canada and the European Union combined,
• 90% of the world’s hungry live with chronic hunger, a nagging hunger that does not go away,
• The direct medical cost of hunger and malnutrition is estimated at $30 billion each year.
• A third of the world’s population is affected by vitamin and mineral deficiencies. These deficiencies compromise the immune system and can result in serious health problems,
• More than 60% of chronically hungry people are women.
• Hunger is often passed from mother to child. Each year, 17 million children are born under weight because their mothers are malnourished,
• About 178 million children world wide are short in stature or stunted because of lack of food, vitamin and mineral deficiencies and disease.
• Malnutrition can also affect a child’s intellectual development Malnourished children often score significantly lower on maths and language achievement tests than do well - nourished children.
• More than 16,000 children die each day from hunger - related conditions.
• Almost all of these deaths occur in developing countries. Sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia suffer from the highest rates of hunger and malnutrition.
• The number of chronically hungry people world wide grows by an average of four million people per year.

Sources:
• World Heath Organization
• World Food Program
• Bread for the World

Activity 4 - Lent

Aim: Giving something up for Lent and giving back to others.

Preparation:
Read Matthew 4:1-11; Mark 1:12-13; and Luke 4:1-13

Instructions:
• Lent begins on Ash Wednesday. This is a Christian tradition in line with Jesus Fasting on the desert for forty days and forty nights.
• Lent is a forty-day period before Easter. It begins on Ash Wednesday. Sundays are not counted when we count the forty days, because Sundays mark Jesus Resurrection. Lent ends on the day before Easter.
• For many Christians, the season of Lent typically includes some kind of fasting. These fasts usually take the form of abstaining from all food throughout a given 24-hour period or certain kinds of food for the duration of the forty-day season. In place of a food fast some Christians commit to give up a pleasurable activity or dedicate themselves to charitable giving.
• Lent is about what Jesus Christ gave up to pay the penalty for the sins of the world
• The idea is to get the children to understand this and to give something up — this could be chocolate, buying trading cards, pocket money, junk food, tizzy drinks etc etc.
• The money that they would have spent on themselves they can bring into BB to donate to a selected cause that will benefit from their own sacrifice. In this way they can begin to look at and understand Jesus sacrifice for them.

Tips/Advice:
There are other ways of doing this without a monetary component. The children can give up their time and help others that way if you can identify something that they can do locally or for the church.

For further details see the BB Junior Pro Pack C2-3

Tags

• charity
• charity Fundraising
• community
• lent
• supporting others

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